Hiding and Changing Plesk GUI Elements

This section describes how to switch on or off, or modify various Plesk features and customize links in Plesk. For example, you can hide all controls related to mail service, or show promotional links in your Plesk. To learn more about these and other possible customizations, read the subsections of this section.

To display, hide, or edit Plesk interface elements, you can use one of the following approaches or a combination of them: run a special command-line utility, modify a license key to Plesk, change configuration files, or configure Plesk server settings through Plesk Partner Central.

Here are some details on these approaches:

• Command line. Changing the Plesk GUI is performed by running the panel_gui and the server_pref utilities. For more information, see the corresponding chapters of the Reference for Command Line Utilities document.
• License key upgrade. You can perform license upgrade via the web-based Partner Central interface or via Partner API - an XML-based remote-call protocol. Below we provide more information about this approach.
• Plesk configuration files. Changing the Plesk GUI requires editing the configuration files:
  • panel.ini for Plesk customizations
  • config for Presence Builder customizations.
• Configuring Plesk through Plesk Partner Central. This approach can be used to configure multiple Plesk installations at once. You can set up Plesk configuration parameters through the Partner Central UI, and associate these settings with one or more license keys. Below we provide more information about this approach.

Note: Plesk Partner Central is a new user interface for buying, tracking and managing Plesk licenses. Its predecessor, Plesk Key Administrator, is now acting as a powerful back-end system. We strongly recommend using Partner Central instead of Key Administrator.

License Key

There are extra features that can be turned on or off in the Plesk license. Those users who have access to the Plesk Partner Central web-based management interface or Partner API can manage extra features.

The license modifications can be done on a per-license level, or be a default for you and applied automatically to all the licenses created for you. In both cases, you should contact Plesk sales: In order to apply the partner-wide defaults, or to enable a particular extra customization on a per-license level.

Important: Once you have turned off a feature through the Partner API, there are no documented methods to turn it back on. If you need to perform this reverse operation, please use the web-based user interface (Partner Central), or contact your sales representative.

Web-based Partner Central User Interface

You can turn on or off extra features through the Partner Central UI > the Manage Licenses tab.

• To turn on or off required features for a new license, start the Buy New License wizard and add the features at step three, the feature management.
• To turn on or off required features for an existing license, click the license name and select the command Upgrade. Then add the features at step two, the Feature Management.
• To turn off a license feature, detach it from the license.

For details on managing license features, see the Partner Central User Guide, sections Managing Licenses and Purchasing Licenses. You can also access this guide by clicking the Help link in the Partner Central UI.

The Partner API

To turn off the extra features in new or existing licenses by means of Partner API, run the appropriate API method with specific feature API identifiers set.

For new licenses:

Add API identifiers of the required features to the "array of identifiers of upgrade plans" parameter of the partner10.createKey method and execute it.

For details on the method specification, see:

http://central.plesk.com/docs/partner-api/1.0, section Specifications of Methods / partner10.createKey

For existing licenses:

Add API identifiers of the required features to the "upgrade plan name" parameter of the partner10.upgradeKey method and execute it.

For details of the method specification, see:

http://central.plesk.com/docs/partner-api/1.0, section Specifications of Methods / partner10.upgradeKey

Configuring Plesk through Partner Central

You can set up configuration settings through the Partner Central UI > the Product Configuration tab, and assign your settings to multiple licenses on the Manage Licenses tab. Partner Central automatically applies the settings to all Plesk installations that have these license keys. These settings can later be overridden by the settings defined via the command line, license key upgrade, or in Plesk configuration files.

For details on creating custom configurations, see the Partner Central User Guide, section Configuring Multiple Plesk Installations. You can also access this guide by clicking the Help link in the Partner Central UI.